Recording the journey…and knitting

I don’t have a lot in the way of WIP right now, but come next week it should really pick up!

Back about two months ago I won some fiber from one of my Ravelry groups. I received some lovely red with muti-clored pieces, of unknown content. I also got some extremely rare CVM or Romeldale, California Variegated Mutant. Well they had me at Mutant! It has lovely tight crimp, and is very fine. I got the fleece raw and washed it. I carded it picking out the lightest going to darkest. I spun it the same way, making a gradient through the whole skein.

I left all the broken and miscolored little bits to make it sluby and tweedy.

This fleece is known for its softness, and wearablity next to the skin. I believe that this yarn wants to be a lacy scarf, stay tuned to see if it will!

Every one loves this salad! It is a great anytime dish, just this week we had it as dinner!

1 bag of salad with carrot and cabbage, I like the Romaine variety

2 green onions thinly sliced

Aprox. 1 cup fresh chopped tomato

Aprox. 1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese

Aprox. 1 and 1/2 cup chopped cooked chicken

Aprox. 1/2 cup small dry pasta like ditali (cook and cool prior to making the salad)

1/2 lb of cooked bacon, chopped.

Creamy Italian, or your favorite dressing

A lot of the ingredients are approximate because I do so much of this by sight. If it looks like a need more tomato, I just add it. Put the Salad into a bowl and using cooking sheers, cut the pieces smaller. toss every thing but the dressing. I prefer to add my own dressing, but you could dress the whole salad and serve with a nice piece of crusty bread. This recipie is great for improviesing! Try what ever you have in the fridge.

So the week before I had the stomach flu with the rest of my family, I was feeling great on Monday and even took a walk. Then It all went down hill! Now I have some sort of ear thing that is making me dizzy, luckily everyday is a bit better.

Gavin graduated from preschool this past week. It has been quite a journey with my little man. He started nearly three years ago not being able to say much at all. Now he can talk up a storm with what his teachers have called an amazing vocabulary. (That would be thanks to the nightly ritual of one or two story books, one chapter of a chapter book, and the “made up” story. Yes, it takes about thirty to forty minuets to actual lights out.) In fall a new chapter will begin with Kindergarten, which to my understanding is *nothing* like it was when I went!

This summer I hope to share the things we do and stuff we learn. We Have the zoo membership this year again, and the library will be a big part. Gavin will be having soccer and swim lessons, and of coarse there will be VBS. I am doing weekly “Themes” again this year too. They were wonderful last year and I am hoping that we will learn new things and also revisit a few favorites.

“Themes” are subjects, like dinosaurs or the solar system, that we explore each week. I start by taking out age appropriate books, then look for things to do around each theme. For example, when we went down town last year, I knew we would be hitting both the Field museum and the Shedd aquarium. Two weeks before we talked about fish and the week of, we did dinosaurs. When we got to the Field museum he was very excited to see Sue the T-Rex. Then at the aquarium, he was able to see some the fish he saw in his books. He was able to share what he had learned those weeks and the information was sort of “cemented” into his memory. I am hoping to take advantage of all the great things we have near by to enrich this summer too.

An appetizer or .party snack or just because I really like them so much!

1 package of cream cheese

1 Italian dressing dry mix packet

some milk, about 3 table spoons

4 or 5 mini seedless cucumbers

Pastry bag and star tip (optional)

Dry dill

With softened cream cheese, mix together with the Italian dressing dry mix, and enough of the milk to make it the consistency of frosting. Attach tip to pastry bag, and fill with the cream cheese mix. Slice the cucumbers into 1/2 inch slices. Pipe the cheese mix onto the cucumbers and top by sprinkling the dill on top.

I had a little trouble piping when larger chunks of seasoning got stuck in the tip, I used a tooth pick to remove the block.